Teacher Refuses Paper on Abortion, “You Can Do Abortion if You Write FOR It”

Abigail Cornejo is a Sophomore at Palatine High School in a small town in Illinois who merely wanted to write a paper on the controversial topic of abortion. But her English teacher had something else in mind and told Conejo she couldn’t write on the topic — and if she did, she would have to write from the pro-abortion perspective.

“My English class is doing a controversial issue research paper,” Abigail told LifeNews. “My English teacher, Mr. David Valentino originally told the class we may not do abortion, euthanasia, or legalization or marijuana. I asked why we couldn’t do infanticide, abortion and he replied with, ‘I’ve read too many papers on it. I don’t care anymore.'”

She continued: “The next day, for my controversial topic I wrote down abortion and he refused to approve my topic. I asked, ‘Why not? You don’t even have a good reason.” He replied in his I’m higher than you and you have to listen to me voice, ‘It’s an ethical debate. I don’t have to have a reason you aren’t doing abortion.’ We quickly argued about it being an ethical debate and then I told him I’m still going to do abortion and his reply was, “‘If you write a paper on abortion I will not read it and you will get an F. This is an essential writing assignment and if you get an F you will fail this class and have to retake it in the summer or next year. It’s your choice I hope you make the right decision.'”

“The ‘right decision’ is controversial,” Abigail said.

The next day Abigail tells LifeNews she went to her classroom and Valentino, who says he is Catholic, asked if she had a topic yet and Abigail told her she would write on something controversial if he would allow it.

She said, “He automatically assumed I was talking about abortion and got mad saying, ‘You are NOT doing a paper on abortion. Do I need to make a call home to your parents? This is not like you at all. You don’t need to fight.'”

Abigail, not worried about her parents’ opinion because she knew they would applaud her for standing up for her pro-life values, says Valentino finally asked her about her opinion on abortion.

“I replied ‘I’m against killing babies!'” she said. “He then said, ‘Alright. You can do abortion IF you write for it.'”